Pictures for my magazine

Out of all of my ideas, I have chosen 7 differen't pictures to go into my magazine cover and contents page. I chose 7 as I wanted quite a lot of pictures but I also didn't want it to look too cramped. 

Here are my pictures that I am putting into my magazine: 

This is a picture that I am going to use on the front of the magazine of the front of the new school gate after 'The Big Build'.

This is a picture of some of the art that is being presented around school. This will go into the contents page. 

This is a picture of the sofas that sixth formers are allowed to sit on. This will go in the contents page.

This is a picture of the school canteen. This is being put in the contents page.

This is a picture of a map of the 'wedge building'. This is to help students find their way around the school. This will go on the contents page.

This is a picture of the house team awards. This will go on the contents page.

This is a picture of The Head teachers office. This is going to be in the contents page.

Text for my magazine

This is the text is going to go in my magazine cover page and my magazine contents page: 

Magazine Cover

• The title of the magazine is going to read 'B.R.T.' with 'BISHOP RAMSEY TIMES' in smaller text underneath the title. 
• Underneath the title, the text will read 'for students' - this is to indicate that there are more magazines maybe for teachers so this magazine can be made and created for students only.

Magazine contents page

On my contents page I am going to have eight stories that are going to be listed on my contents page: 

• The main story of the magazine is going to be named 'The Big Build' (the new building that was built)
• The second story will be named 'What's happening around school?' (e.g. sport events, art events etc)
• The third story will be named 'Sofas for Sixth-formers' (this story would be giving the feedback of students behaviour of that week. E.g. too much litter)
• The fourth story will be named 'The BR menu' (the menu for the next week) 
• The fifth story will be named 'Know Your Way' (for the new students who need help knowing their way around school) 
• The sixth story will be named 'Competitions' (reader will get to know who won the last event and also what house team is first) 
• The seventh story will be named 'Mr Wilcock's say' (where our head teacher gets to write a bit about the past week and tells students what they've done well) 
• The eighth story will be named 'Speak Out' (students get to have their own page to comment on anything to do with school that week) 

Possible picture ideas

On our school magazine front cover and contents page, we need at least four pictures to go on it and inside it. In this lesson we were asked to think of at least thirty pictures that we might use for your cover and contents page. 

Possible picture ideas:

• One of my pictures may be of the school logo - this is to show the audience what school it is actually coming from and to generally show the audience that the school logo is an important image that students/teachers/parents know as it is the school that they attend. 
• another picture could be of the different houses within the school - each of the houses logo's e.g. in Bishop Ramsey there are 'Rochester', 'St. Albans', 'Manchester', 'Salisbury', 'Exeter' and 'York'. This will not only show the audience what houses there are but will show that there is friendly competition between them which events like Sports Day and 'interhouse' competitions support. 
• another picture could be of the school sofa's that only sixth formers are allowed to sit on - there could be a passage reminding students of the sixth form to treat the sofa areas correctly e.g. no littering and no feet on the sofas. 
• a picture of a student wearing the correct uniform and a student not wearing the correct uniform to both school and sixth form - this is to remind students of what they should be looking like and the schools expectations. 
• a picture of art that are being displayed around the school - to keep updates on different events e.g. art competitions.
• a picture of the old school - to tell the audience about the 'big build' which is happening in my magazine. 
• a picture of the new school - to show the audience and tell them that the new school has successfully been built and is ready for students to learn in.
• a picture of notices around the school e.g. 'no food in the corridors'  - this will remind the students and teachers that they are not supposed to be eating in corridors.
• a picture of a map around the area of the school - this indicates where the school actually is to the people who may not know
• a picture of a map around the school site - this will be helpful to new students or teachers who don't know their way around the school. 
• a picture of students studying - showing the audience what the students get up to and to represents our schools 'hard workers' 
• a picture of teachers teaching - showing the audience what the teaching environment looks like.
• a picture of highgrove pool - showing the audience that people who take gcse get to go to the swimming pool right next to the school and also compete in galas.
• a picture of the new p.e equipment we have in the school to show the readers the new excellent resources which our school are now able to use to improve the students education.
• a picture of posters advertising different events that are going to be happening weekly -          remind anyone involved the dates and times or to invite people to come and watch.
• a picture of the '696' bus which is Bishop Ramsey's school bus - to remind students of times that the bus comes or any changes or differences to the time table - also any messages that the bus driver wants to tell the students.
• a few pictures of the different food being sold at our school - to show readers that the schools food is healthy but enjoyable at school. Or to indicate price changes or differences in the menu.
• pictures of the head teacher - showing that he has his own personal bit in the magazine that will tell you information that he thinks you will need to know for that week.

Stories in my magazine

We were asked to think and decide on our stories to go in our school magazines. I had about 10 different ideas originally to go into my magazine contents page but as I thought it would look a bit too cramped I cut it down to seven.

My story ideas:

• 'The big build' - This is a story on the 'big build' as Bishop Ramsey is making a newer and 'better' school for students to learn in. This story would have all the updates of the build and dates on when it will be ready to work in. 
• 'Bus info' - This story is for all the students who get on the '696 school bus' to and from school. It would give information about times that may have changed because of certain events and would also let the students know what the bus drivers are thinking (basically giving them feed back on how their behaviour is for the past week).
• 'Olympic student' - This is a story about how one of the students who attended Bishop Ramsey won a gold in the olympics. 
• 'The next JK Rowling' - This is a story about another student who is waiting for her books to be published and is said to be 'the next JK Rowling'.
• 'Mr. Wilcocks say' - This a part in the magazine where the head teacher can have his say. He will talk about anything that he's been impressed with over the past week and praises the students. 
• 'What's going on?' - This would be a party of the magazine that tells the reader everything that is going on during that week. It will also include any reminders the students or teachers will need to know. E.g. 'Remember it's non-school-uniform on Friday'. 
• 'Student time' - This would be a part in the magazine where students can publish their own story or just generally tell people about what has been happening in their lives so it gives a student a time to have their say.

Indesign practise

In order for us to create our magazine, we need to be able to know how to use Indesign properly. We are using Indesign to actually put together our magazine and create our final magazine cover and contents page. 

Left hand side tool bar: 

• Arrow tool - selects
• T - text tool - allows you to draw a text box and write the text you want - when using text tool, the boxes at the top change to allow you to change font, size etc. 
•  Rectangle tool - creates shapes (right click for different shapes) for text or pictures -  to fit the text/picture – go to object and fitting.
•   Eye dropper tool – allows you take a colour from a picture and use it for another part of your page.

Right hand side tool bar:

•        Stroke - If you want a border, select first then click stroke and border.
•        Swatch -Used to change colours - choose outline or fill colour - Can create your own swatch by clicking new swatch on the bottom row - If you create your own swatch, you can use this on every document by choosing the menu on swatches and load swatches to upload all the ones you have created.

     General tips:

•       To add pictures, click file – place and search for your pictures
•       To move images/text in front or behind another image/text, go to object and arrange
•       To include columns, choose object and text frame options
•        Select window – text wrap and you can wrap text around a shape or an image
•        If your pictures appear low resolution, highlight the picture and click view – display performance and high quality display

Photoshop practise

In this lesson we were given this sheet and were told to complete the steps in order to help us learn what photoshop is like and have a chance to practice.

















Here, I have taken pictures of my poster through a few of the steps.

This one of the first steps, in these steps I had to place this picture in, then use 'edit' and 'free transform' to drag it and fit the poster. I then had to right click on the 'layer' and then choose 'rasterize'.

I then went on to make a 'new layer mask' and then choose the 'gradient tool' from the tool bar. I then had to click and drag a line from the bottom of the poster to half way up and this would make the bottom fade.

On the next few steps, I had to make the poster a little more see through and faded, by doing this I chose the 'opacity' option. I then had to place another picture on top of Amanda Seyfried. I had to use 'edit' and 'free transform' to make her the right size. I then had to 'rasterize' the picture again which enabled me to edit her picture. Then I used the 'quick selection tool' to crop Amanda out which would leave no background and would be left with just Amanda holding the letter.

Then, I had to use the 'gradient tool' again to fade part of Amanda's picture. I then placed a picture of Gerald Butler next to the picture of Amanda. By using 'edit' and 'free transform' and 're size' him, I was able to make him look the same size as Amanda. Then, I 'rastersized' his picture too.

In the next few steps, I repeated everything that I did to Amanda's picture to Gerald's picture. I then placed another picture on top of a person drawing a love heart. I had to 'rastersize' this an then crop around it so there would be no background around it.

I then placed pictures of the credits (also who is involved in the 'movie' being advertised on this poster) and the film certificate. To the credits, I had to resize them so they would cover the whole of the bottom of the poster and then had to resize the film certificate to fit into the bottom corner.

I then used the 'text tool' to create the title on the poster. I had to drag the text box to the top of the poster, name it 'Love Letter' and colour it red. I then had to change the sizing of the text to '72pt' size and the font to 'Trajan font'.

School Magazines

Today in our lesson we were talking about our magazine plans and were asked to answer the following questions: 

Describe your ideal reader: age, gender, appearance and interests

• My ideal reader would be a student with their age ranging from 11-18 and both genders. Someone who wears uniform to school or have a set dress code for school, e.g. students/sixth formers. And their interests involving wanting to know about what is happening in the school and wanting to be able to get involved with school. 

Map out a typical day for your ideal reader 

• A typical day for my reader would be that they would go to school, come home from school and then try to complete any homework given. Afterwards they may go to a club or do a hobby e.g. scouts/dancing/football. 

If your magazine could be summed up in one word, what word would that be? 

• If my magazine could be summed up in one word it would be 'enchanting'.

Imagine you had 30 seconds to pitch your magazine to a publisher. Write the pitch. 

• My magazine is a really colourful, captivating and fun magazine for all students. It isn't just a generally average school magazine, its made so the students will actually want to read it and for them to actually be learning, observing and getting to know their school better from it. Inside, it will obviously describe and explain loads of things happening such as events and rule changes around the school, but it will be put into a way that a student wouldn't actually mind reading.

My school magazine

In this lesson we were asked to create a plan for our school magazines. I decided to do a magazine for all students at Bishop Ramsey School.

This is an example plan and layout of what the front of my magazine and the contents of the magazine may look like:

• In my magazine, I wanted to make it for all students at Bishop Ramsey so I decided to make a magazine that 11-18 year olds would actually want to read. I didn't want it to look boring with little use of colour, so instead I made it into a colourful and cartoon like magazine. I think that with lots of use of colour, pictures and a mixture of texts would attract the students as it is not like a usual news paper or school magazine. 
• I used the school logo as the background but kind of turned it into cartoon-like as I changed the colour and 'filtered' it which gave it a different looking texture. On the contents page, I still used the school logo but filtered it to another different looking texture so the text would be easier to read over the top of it.
• I named it 'B.R.T.' with the subheading stating 'Bishop Ramsey Times' so it would look more cool and short so the student would be more attracted to it. 'B.R.T.' is also easier and quicker to say so it will be more attractive. 
• Also, I added 'FOR STUDENTS' to indicate that this is for students only and that there are other school magazines which are for teachers and parents.
• I made the contents page look as bright and colourful as possible with loads of pictures and different texts. I did this so students would be attracted to it and actually would want to read on. I don't want my magazine to look boring, as I know when I see a newspaper or a school magazine and they're not colourful or don't include a lot of pictures, I would probably would give up reading it after a while. 
• I think there is maybe a little too much pictures on it as it looks a bit overcrowded but I wanted to test out what it would look like before I do the actual preliminary magazine.